Activision Blizzard buys freedom from Vivendi

MartinKDahl · Jul 2013

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2013/jul/26/activision-blizzard-splits-vivendi

Pretty big move considering they spent $5.83bn. Looks like vivendi is selling to reduce its pile of debt.

Guess this is all on the publisher side of things and won't affect the game companies much.

Anyways thoughts?

Mark Dygert · Jul 2013

Nom nom nom... NO---(oh crap its stuck, wait no there goes)--OM.

That was a pretty big bite but I guess Vivendi has been weakening for a while now. I'm sure shareholders somewhere are dancing in the streets.

nick2730 · Jul 2013

maybe bring back homewrold

kaptainkernals · Jul 2013

@nick, gearbox owns howeworld now, and are re-releasing HD versions of HW1+2

peanut · Jul 2013

If they are releasing HD version of HW1+2 then its a safe bet that there will be a HW3 somewhere down the line.

ambershee · Jul 2013

Thread title is misleading. Activision did not acquire Vivendi, they bought some of Activision back from Vivendi.

Snefer · Jul 2013

No no no, you got that totally wrong :P Actiblizzard are bying themselves back, that means they are now independent from vivendi, who was owning them previously. So now Vivendi and activision blizzard are two separate things. :P Also Activision blizzard is running very profitable, but Vivendi needed/wanted the cash injection in the short run.

Mark Dygert · Jul 2013

Yep, Tor is right.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2013-07-26-activision-blizzard-goes-independent-as-kotick-leads-USD8-2-billion-buyout

MartinKDahl · Jul 2013

Sorry about the misleading title, snefer is of course right about it being a bid for independence. Will be interesting to see if this signals the gradual decline of vivendi and their place as a major publisher gone for good.

joeriv · Jul 2013

they were never a company that just published games.
It's just that they were sucessfull, and then expanded into other things such as games.
But now that they aren't doing to hot (they have been trying to sell activision-blizzard for a while now, must be almost a year or longer by now, it's just that no one was willing to huge price tag they were asking), and (afaik) under pressure from the shareholders they are refocusing again and getting rid of everything that isn't part of that.

so, I don't really see them getting back into games anytime soon.

GarageBay9 · Jul 2013

kaptainkernals wrote: »

@nick, gearbox owns howeworld now, and are re-releasing HD versions of HW1+2

They don't NEED "HD" versions, they were freaking perfect. You don't paint lens flares and shit all over the Mona Lisa. :poly141:

Just update it under the hood to talk with DX11 and call it good...

kaptainkernals · Jul 2013

--OFF TOPIC--

"During a panel at PAX Australia today, Gearbox announced upcoming HD remakes of Homeworld and Homeworld 2. In addition, the studio will make original, unaltered versions of both games available digitally."

There's both, caters for those who want the "HD" version, and then the original versions.

--END OFF TOPIC--

StephenVyas · Jul 2013

and the stock just jumped 14%+

leilei · Jul 2013

Still miss Sierra.

Activision Blizzard buys freedom from Vivendi

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